Jon Stewart: "I can't handle it"

On a rainy dark night, I crammed into a standing room only Barnes and Noble near Union Square in NYC to hear The Daily Show’s Jon Stewart who appeared with his cast of writers and their new book “Earth: The Book: A Visitor’s Guide to the Human Race.” Jon was to speak and answer audience questions. While most questions seemed fairly benign, a couple of people started asking more challenging questions about the terrorist attacks of September 11th 2001. Jon’s response was revealing.

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Suddenly, someone yelled out, “what about 9/11? There was never a credible investigation! How can you believe the lie?” Jon responded with, “I’m a (inaudible) …because I think Al-Qaeda did it?” The same person or another, (I’m not sure, I was so far in the back) said something in response, and someone asked Jon, “what about building 7!” (In reference, to WTC building 7, which was a nearby building, which fell at free fall speed despite not being struck with any planes or significant debris.). Jon responded, “well, I’m not an engineer…” to which I thought, “Jon, I MUST introduce you to an engineer, who can tell you a lot about controlled demolitions and how the WTC towers were brought down.” I hope Jon Stewart will meet Richard Gage, as I have.

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After Jon said, “I’m not an engineer…” he paused as police rushed towards the activist who kept trying to talk. Jon then said, “if you stop interrupting you can stay. Did you at least by a book?” The audience nervously tittered. As the activist quieted down, Jon then said in a hilarious tone, “any more 9/11 questions?” to which I said loudly and supportively, “yeah!” Jon looked up, but I was too far in the back for him to see me. What Jon Stewart said then was extremely telling. “You know what it is folks? I live down there and its too traumatic… even now.” I knew what he meant. During the ninth anniversary of the 9.11.01 attacks a few weeks earlier, a survivor told me, “some of us still haven’t been down to ground zero. Its still too much for us…” One mother, who had lost her son, braved the effects of her trauma and went down to ground zero for the first time on 9.11.09.

As someone who lived only a few blocks away and in “the zone” that had been initially sealed off by the National Guard in the immediate aftermath of the attacks, I would never forget the hundreds of fliers posted around our hometown with faces of husbands, children, wives, some of poor immigrants… as families searched in vain for their loved ones. Left with only each other to console. At the time, I was an intern at Democracy Now. Though “shocked and awed” at first by the attacks, many eventually refused to believe the Bush/Cheney explanation and narrative and launched an independent investigation into a crime of such great magnitude that none of us expected or expected to be witnesses to. What we found is indisputable and irrefutable evidence that leads us to Dick Cheney’s door. Michael Ruppert who wrote “The Decline of the American Empire at the End of the Age of Oil” has said of the attacks that, “this is a crime that is prosecutable in court…”

Trauma however, is not about logic and argument and analysis. It is a severe psychological and emotional injury. Trauma is a word of Greek origin, which means, “wound” as in “our wounds are still raw and still hurt.” Jon actually said, “I still cannot handle it.”

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Since the attacks of 9.11.01, those seeking the truth have included many survivors, Fire department personnel, military personnel, scientific professionals, credible long time investigative journalists, and innumerable “ordinary” citizens. Some are “patriots” and some are “anarchists”. Sometimes we don’t have much in common, and other times, we share a burning desire to know the truth and spit out the lie that makes us sick. We are forced to “handle” the truth. We are sometimes attacked and ridiculed, but we silence is not an option nor do we apologize for seeking and speaking the truth because of the 3000 plus people who died in the attacks, cannot ask questions. That is for the living to do. Us! We will not be silenced like they were.

Great story . . . it’s wonderful to read from people’s own words, their own experience. I appreciated the insight, particularly:

“Trauma however, is not about logic and argument and analysis. It is a severe psychological and emotional injury.”

Indeed. The capture of Jon Stewart’s implicit and also explicit admission of his own trauma is a great example of the huge and deep issue we are all faced with in attempting to expose the false basis for a war, a psychological assault at it’s core, and we all deal with it in different ways. Proximity to trauma has been shown to affect people physiologically and emotionally in relative ways, and yet, we each respond differently to that assault, for many different reasons.